In advanced civilizations the period loosely called Alexandrian is usually associated with flexible morals, perfunctory religion, populist standards and cosmopolitan tastes, feminism, exotic cults, and the rapid turnover of high and low fads—in short, a falling away (which is all that decadence means) from the strictness of traditional rules, embodied in character and inforced from within. — Jacques Barzun

Someone should be fired over this…

but of course they won’t be. A North Carolina preschooler wasn’t allowed to eat her lunch—a turkey and cheese sandwich, banana, potato chips, and apple juice—because it didn’t meet federal guidelines. Instead, she was given a school lunch, and ate chicken nuggets. Federal guidelines require that a lunch include one serving each of meat, dairy, and grain, and two of fruits and vegetables. Children’s lunches are checked for this, and, if they don’t measure up, kids are given cafeteria food, and the parents are charged for the cost.

Forgive me, but I can think of no other response: WTF?

In what world are chicken nuggets healthier than a turkey and cheese sandwich? Don’t the guidelines get something fundamental to nutrition wrong—namely that it’s not a meal-by-meal thing? (My lunch yesterday: ten $.50 chicken wings (meat—check), four $1 beers (grain—check), a few celery chunks (vegetable—check). No dairy, no fruit—call the feds!) Just how do you pack a lunch with meat and dairy that doesn’t have to be refrigerated, except by packing such a sandwich? Why is meat required? What about vegetarian students? What about kids with allergies to dairy or grain products?

But most important of all: what business is this of the government? Why on earth are they checking student lunches in the first place?

The cafeteria worker should be fired over this, yes. So should the principal. And so should the person ultimately responsible for these federal guidelines—Barack Obama.

FURTHER UPDATE: Lunch-in! February 23 at noon. “Concerned parents and their supporters will be having a “lunch-in” on Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C. at noon on Thursday, February 23 to protest federal school nutrition guidelines that allegedly forced at least one student to forgo her mother’s home-packed lunch in favor of chicken nuggets.”

Like this:

Related

3 Responses

Thanks Philo. I was hoping you’d comment on this. I dropped a link to this story on my FB page yesterday, but haven’t had enough time to cool off my steaming hot collar and put some cogent thought together.

If I was that mom, I’d show up to eat lunch with my daughter the next day with powdered doughnuts, pancakes and syrup, M&M’s, and a Happy Meal (with toy). And then start homeschooling.

But wait! There’s more: By far the worst aspect of this is the active undermining of the parent’s authority. That a no-nothing state “inspector” hack could overrule Mom (or Dad) about what goes into her 4 y/o’s mouth is outrageous. What does the kid learn? Not good eating habits, but that Mom isn’t the final arbiter of her care. Mom needs to be overseen. Mom is ignorant of “the rules.” Big Brother is the one who *really* cares.

I’d have some choice words for any State Inspector of Lunches, beginning with eff and ending with off.

I am truly sorry, but if you think that fascism in schools will end just because Obama is no longer in office you are sadly mistaken.
This is USDA, Dept of Education etc. Unless the candidates you are supporting are talking about getting rid of these “Departments of Control Over The Citizens Lives” then it will only get worse.
So far as I can tell there is only one candidate that is addressing any of this. All the rest are on board with it to one extent or another by their tacit approval of the continuation of government run by bureaucrats instead of Constitution.
Only one candidate is willing to try to lead us out of this muck and mire. The rest are like a bunch of hogs wallowing in their own filth and loving that as well as all of the filth of every other political pig out there. Oink Oink
Take your pick. But you will get what you choose folks. Don’t blame us for your problems when the Republicans turns out just as piggish as the Dems if they can win.
This is about people who crave power. We have almost no statesmen left who run because it is the right thing to do. Every candidate wants to make changes through taking control. One of them is planing to do nothing except veto everything that is Unconstitutional and begin to change us back to a less active government.